


The First of Many

by KeeLimeArt



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Fighting, Gen, Mention of Ignis - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-04
Updated: 2017-02-04
Packaged: 2018-09-21 20:55:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9566048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KeeLimeArt/pseuds/KeeLimeArt
Summary: Since Prompto was chosen to be on Noctis's royal party, he had to go through some basic training to prepare him to fight in the outer world.He just didn't think that the first life he would take would be a human.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LiaLox](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LiaLox/gifts).



“Again,” Gladio demanded. He reached down with his hard, wooden practice sword and took a swipe at the boy that was laying on the ground.

“Agh. This is ridiculous,” Prompto groaned as he got up by using all fours. He took a long sigh and stood in a slouched pose, not pleased with his current situation, and definitely not looking like he was going to start ‘again’.

Only days before, the members of Prince Noctis’s royal party were confirmed, much to the concern of King Regis. Ignis and Gladio were, of course, obvious choices for the job. Ever since Noct had been a small child, the two have played a role in his life somehow, someway. While Gladio, the king’s shield, was strong and fast, Ignis was quick witted and, if one were telling the truth, and excellent cook. With traits such as those, it would have been hard for both father and son to refuse them. Even so, noct considered them to be close friends of his.

Then came the issue of Prompto Argentum. King Regis knew that the prince and the blonde had been the best of friends ever since the beginning of high school, but to place him in the royal party? The party was, of course, just a friendly way of saying ‘guard’. The group was really forged to protect the prince on his way to marry Lady Lunafreya. For many days, the king and the prince argued whether or not they should include the blonde boy.

“Prompto can protect himself as much as anyone!” Noctis argued for his friend.

King Regis sighed. Obviously, Noct was going to be stubborn about this thing, as usual. “I understand that. Anybody will protect themselves if it ever came to that, but I’m not sure if he’ll be able to protect you.”

Noct’s hands balled into fists as he easily became irritated. “What are you saying? Are you saying that Prompto wouldn’t try to help? That he doesn’t care?”

“That’s not what I’m saying at all!” the king countered, rising to his feet. “I’m just asking you, as your father, to consider somebody else that would do better with the job. Noctis, please, I am concerned for you, and I just want to make sure that you do what’s right.”

The thoughts lay heavy on Noct’s mind. For a second, he turned on his heel, his back facing his father, to allow himself to think. 

“Prompto’s coming with us,” he slowly determined, not looking back towards his father. 

Regis carefully walked up to Noct and laid a loving hand on his shoulder. “If you insist, then so be it,” he solemnly agreed. “But if you’re serious, then I ask you this.”

“What?” Noct coldly demanded, glancing at the king from the corner of his eye.

“Let Gladiolus run him through some basic training exercises to prepare him,” King Regis requested. It was a simple suggestion that the prince couldn’t refuse.

And that’s how Prompto repeatedly ended up falling on his rear end in Gladio’s back yard. Though Prompto had met the strong men plenty of time because of Noct, he had no idea what to expect for the miniature ‘training sessions’. However, whatever it was, he certainly wasn’t expecting the grueling practice that he was being put through. Though they would often do hand to hand combat, Gladio mostly focused on fighting with swords.

“Come on, if you can’t fight me with these toothpicks, what makes you think you can fight off daemons out there?” Galdio taunted.

“You’re not exactly starting me off easy,” Prompto countered in a raspy voice. After two days with Gladio, he was getting beaten up quite well. 

Gladio snorted in laughter at his response. “This? You think this is hard? I did these exercises with Noct when he was eight!” He took a step back and got into a fighting stance. “Now, come on! We don’t have long to prepare!”

Prompto leaned his head back a let out a long, tired moan. “But Gladio… I tired… and I can’t do this. I’m just not a swordsman,” he whined. 

Gladio lowered his dulled weapon and crossed his arms. “You’re acting like I’m enjoying this. I like doing this with you as much as you do, trust me, but Noct wants you on the team. The king wants you to train for it. Are you going to go against the king’s orders?” he challenged. Those words caused Prompto to straighten out immediately. Well, he did the best he could, considering his situation.

“Can’t I just-“ he began as Gladio lunged at him. With some effort, he blocked the attack. “Have a different weapon?” His opponent’s false blade poked him quite roughly in the thigh, causing him to take several steps back. 

Gladio grunted in agitation. “Oh yeah? And what did you have in mind?”

Prompto shrugged. He was just complaining for the heck of it, not thinking that he was going to get anywhere with it. “I- I don’t know,” he told the other man. “Something like a gun? That’s easy to handle, and not as heavy.”

“You haven’t even picked up one of the actual swords!” Gladio pointed out.

“Yeah, and if I can barely hold these, do you think that I’ll be able to hold one of those?” he rhetorically wondered. 

Gladio slapped a hand to his face. Why did that boy have to be so persistent? He walked over to the blonde and tried to explain things as clearly as possible, leaving no scorn out of his answer.

“Oh, yeah, right. We give you a gun, you point it at something while we’re fighting, and you hit Noct instead. Or, better example, somehow we end up with a group of strong daemons, daemons with thick skins or shells that will just reflect your bullets like seeds against a sheet of steel. You can’t do anything like that. We fail. Noct ends up getting killed. Then again, the bullet could bounce off of it just right and hit Noct,” Gladio informed. He took a menacing step forward and got into Prompto’s face. “Get the picture?”

“Your examples are a bit harsh, don’t you think?” Prompto bravely asked, though his voice was shaking. “I mean, every time something goes wrong in them, Noct ends up dying.”

“Well, if you don’t think like that and stop taking this seriously, it could happen.”  
\-----  
Prompto took those words to heart, and never stopped his training with Gladio. For the next few weeks, all had been getting better. After school every day, he would head over to Gladio’s for a little training. Every now and then, he would be accompanied by Noct, making the day more enjoyable and less serious than it would be on their own. He could feel that he was getting better at sword fighting, mostly because he found himself on the ground less and less, but also because Gladio wasn’t yelling at him as much. With a bit more time, perhaps he would be ready. 

However, one day, Noct was feeling a bit adventurous. Too many days had he been holed up with Ignis in the apartment that they shared. If he didn’t get away from him soon, he was going to lose it, as if he wasn’t having a hard time already. Instead of heading home or to Gladio’s one afternoon, he decided to bring him along and they would simply go walking.

“But, won’t they find out and punish us?” Prompto wondered, the idea not settling well with him.

“No, not as long as we’re back in two hours or so. Ignis will just assume that I went to Gladio’s house, and we can tell Gladio that you suddenly fell sick. They’ll never suspect a thing. Besides, what could go wrong? We’re just heading to the market not too far from here,” the prince persuaded. 

Prompto’s face contorted into a half frown, but he agreed anyways. Once the thought had time to grow and develop in his mind, the more he discovered that he was actually excited about it. It had been too long since the two friends could hang out in plain daylight and too long since Prompto could catch a break from the intense training. Hey, he deserved it after all. At least, that’s what he kept telling himself to keep from feeling guilty. 

The walk through the market was enjoyable, at the very least. They didn’t really buy anything, so it was more of a stroll, as Noct suggested. A couple of hours of goofing off did them some good. Prompto had forgotten what Noct’s laugh sounded like and look of his face when he smiled. It was exceptionally present when Prompto tried to sneak a few sweets from a stall. He succeeded for about two seconds before the merchant noticed what went missing and chased the boys through the ailes, the two of them laughing all the way. Once the coast was clear, their pace slowed in the alley that they used to escape, and they placed their hands on their knees, trying to catch their breath.

“Can’t,” Prompto gasped, “do anything like that in a supermarket.”

“Yeah…” Noct agreed. “For a second, I thought that he was actually going to catch up.”

“Nah. He was too small to keep up with the prince and a part of his royal guard,” the blonde joking, giving Noct a playful slap on the shoulder. 

After one more deep breath, Noct stood and began to head for the exit. “Come on, let’s get out of here. You know about those weirdos that like to sneak up on you in alleys.” As if on cue, just before he turned around the corner, a dark figure twisted Noct’s arm around and braced the prince against his chest. Though he didn’t hold the boy very tight, the blade near his neck made Noct second think any ideas about moving.

“Not another word, or I’ll slit his throat,” a gruff voice stated. 

Prompto’s eyes widened as he realized what was going on. He took a nervous step back, onto to run into the chest of yet another hooded figure, trying to take hold of him as well. This one was unarmed, confident that he could take on the puny boy with his bare hands. This was exactly what he’d been training for. The prince was in trouble, and he was the only one who could help. 

“Just don’t think about it, and do it exactly as we practiced,” a few wise words from Gladio came back to him, and he did exactly that.

Prompto whipped around quickly, taking his enemy off guard and initiating his attack. From then on, it was exactly how he and Gladio had done it, a thousand times before. Something in his brain drew a blank. There was nothing in the world other than him and his counter attack. For two seconds, Prompto became nothing more than a soldier following orders, and he didn’t seem to mind it one bit.

First, disarm them.

It wasn’t too hard to do. The difficult part was that he and Gladio always practiced with the toy swords while they were disarming each other. Instead of a sword hanging at the intruder’s waist, it was a firearms. Either way, the blonde knew that he had to take it. He reached deep into the holster and pulled out the weapon, giving his enemy a hard kick to the chest as he did so. He didn’t even take a breath as he cocked the weapon and aimed it at the figure. All it took was a pull of the trigger.

The other, who still held onto Noct, stood stiff as the loud crack of gun fire resounded in the area. With an act like that, it would only be minutes before the police arrived, and he wouldn’t be able to defend himself then. Despite the fall of his ally, he had himself to look after. Without a moment of hesitation, he took off down the street, but Prompto wouldn’t let him get very far.

Don’t leave a battle you’re winning if there’s more than one of them left. They could always come back.

Prompto most certainly would have considered himself to be winning that battle. He stepped out of the alley, set the gun again, and fired. The blonde took down his target as if it were no more than an animal in the wild.

Noct remained in the alley, getting on his knees to examine the person that Prompto shot. After a quick test, though it was obvious what state he was in, the prince stood.

“Dead,” he breathed, turning back to look at Prompto. His friend did not react to the new information. If anything, it only caused him to freeze in his spot. “Prompto, are you okay?” Noct walked up to the blonde and turned him around by the shoulder. His friend’s face was as white as a sheet, and his mouth was parted slightly as his attention was directed towards the ground.

“I don’t feel… Anything,” he slowly confessed.  
\-----  
“You did WHAT?” Gladio asked in disbelief. The first place they went to was, of course, his house. If they went and told Ignis, the posh man would have had a meltdown. At least with Gladio, that had some sort of chance of surviving. 

Noct leaned against the wall with his arms crossed, having to be the one to relay the story. Prompto sat on the couch with a blanket, silently watching the movement of his tea. He spoke not a word since the two got out of the alley. Gladio pinched the bridge of his nose as the stress got to him, but upon seeing Prompto’s expression he lightened up.

“I’m proud of you,” admitted the tall, strong man. Prompto looked up with a gasp of surprise. “It’s true, I am. Most people wouldn’t have thought to do that on their first time, and there you go, falling two people after the life of the prince. I’ve gotta tell you, that takes some guts, and to think that you succeeded… Well, I just want to tell you that I’m proud. You seem to be taking it pretty well, too.”

Prompto’s hand tightened its grip on his tea cup, causing his knuckles to turn a ghostly white. His intestines were twisting into more knots with every second that passed, though Gladio eased the pain some. He couldn’t figure out the right words to respond to it, so he simply asked what had been nagging at his mind.

“Can I keep the gun now?”

**Author's Note:**

> A requested story from LiaLox.  
> Always taking requests for anything. Just give me a shout. (Clean requests only, please)  
> And if you want more from Final Fantasy XV, I've got everything ranging from fluff to kick-you-in-the-heart, with more on the way.


End file.
